By Any Other Name
by WonkasChocolate
Summary: "Hey, Squall! Picture him in a suit with a ponytail. Who do you think of? Quickquickquick!" A silly fic involving Axel and Yuffie and the snark that ensues when they're together. Yuffie, Axel, Leon; mentions of Axel/Kairi and Leon/Yuffie.


**Title:** By Any Other Name  
**Author:** WonkasChocolate  
**Rating:** PG  
**Characters/Pairings:** Axel, Yuffie, Leon; mentions of Leon/Yuffie and Axel/Kairi.  
**Disclaimer:** I am no king, therefore I own no Kingdom.  
**A/N:** A silly fic about Yuffie and Axel written as a birthday gift for Fuuga Kumi. I watched Final Fantasy: Advent Children before I started writing this. It probably explains a lot...

* * *

"You know, I don't think you're who you say you are," Yuffie muses, staring at Axel with a strange intensity that proves she does indeed have an attention span longer than thirty seconds.

"Oh yeah? How do you figure?" Axel asks, glancing at her.

They are in the Borough, taking a break from the duties Leon assigned them that morning, even though they haven't exactly started them in the first place ("Who made scarface the boss, anyway?" Axel had said upon receiving his patrol orders). Yuffie swings her legs against the wall they're sitting on, still staring unblinkingly at Axel. "The tattoos are different," she says pointing under his eyes, "and you lost the earring –" she emphasises this by flicking his earlobe.

"Hey!" Axel interjects and pulls away from her.

Yuffie ignores him and continues, "–but you're Reno, for sure."

He glares and rubs his ear in an overly dramatic way. "Sorry to disappoint, short-stuff, but I've never heard of him."

"Well, Reno's been gone for years now, pretty much dropped off the face of the world, even before the darkness took this place. So, obviously, you lost all your memories, then being lost and alone, started going by a much cooler name, finally ditched that stupid stick you used to fight with and got those circle blade thingies, got mixed in with the bad guys…again, came to your senses and joined the good guys…again, got yourself a jailbait girlfriend in Kairi over there, and now here we are all over again, fighting new baddies!"

Axel just stares at her for a few moments, then laughs shortly. "Man, are you a loony toon!"

"You can't prove that you aren't," Yuffie says without a hint of self-doubt.

He snorts. "After that fantasy story of yours, should I even try?"

"Nope." She flashes him a sunbright grin that lights up the entire surrounding area and Axel finds himself thinking that any Shadows lurking around better run for cover if they know what's good for them, because if the light of that smile doesn't get them, her kunai certainly will. And Axel knows better than anyone; you're not truly a part of the family in Radiant Garden until you've been on the receiving end of at least one of Yuffie's weapons. He's got the scar on his left leg to prove it.

"I bet I can find Rude, too. And Vincent!" Yuffie cartwheels precariously along the three-story wall at the prospect. "The Great Ninja Yuffie is on the case!"

Axel watches her progress with mild interest. "Sit down, will you? I know scarface will find some way to blame me if you kill yourself."

"When did you start being such a killjoy?" she calls from the other side of the wall.

"When I got my heart ripped out and became an empty shell of a person."

"Not an excuse," she says, and Axel chuckles because anyone else would have lowered their gaze, would have apologised guiltily to their shoes, but not Yuffie. As annoying as she is sometimes, Axel has grown to admire her in the few months he's lived in Radiant. She reminds him a bit of Roxas, though he can't quite put his finger on why.

(Probably because she's a stubborn pain in the ass, just like he always was.)

"You know, you're the only runt in the world who thinks that."

"Well, you're alive, aren't you?" she asks, cartwheeling back across the length of the wall and plopping down next to him.

"Technically speaking."

"Technical shmechnical. Have some fun with your boring life, sourpuss. At least when you went by Reno you knew how to do that."

He folds his arms behind his head and flops backward, legs still hanging over the side of the wall, and smirks wickedly up at the pale sky. "Oh, believe me, short-stuff, I know how to have fun. Kairi can tell you."

Yuffie grimaces and waves her arms frantically. "Eww! I do _not_ need to know the yucky details of your jailbait exploits!"

Axel laughs. "Well, well, well, look who's being a prude! You and scarface are way worse than—"

"Hey! What the hell are you two doing?" Leon snaps from below them, looking disgruntled.

"Discussing how disgustingly thin the walls are in this place," Axel says brightly, pushing himself back into an upright position and grinning down at Leon. "Someone should really work on the quality of craftsmanship here, you know."

Before Leon can come up with a biting retort Yuffie calls down to him, "Hey, Squall! Picture him in a suit with a ponytail. Who do you think of? Quickquickquick!" Leon looks slightly caught off guard (a rare occurrence because Yuffie is known to say approximately twelve outlandish things a day and he's long been past the point of caring) but before he can even respond Yuffie says, "It's Reno, right? He's totally Reno!"

Leon looks at Axel like he's actually _considering_ it, that he might be Reno, and Axel groans. "Come on, you guys. Can't you just accept me for who I am?" he asks melodramatically, holding a hand to his forehead and pretending to swoon. "My name's Axel!" he cries, "A-X-E-L, got it memorised?"

"Will you shut up with that 'got it memorised' thing?" Yuffie says, grinning anyway. "It's a pretty stupid catchphrase. Don't you think so, Squally?"

"No need to answer that," Axel says, looking down at Leon as he pushes himself off the wall and brushes the dust off his backside. "And you can keep your scar on. We're going, alright?" He loops an arm around Yuffie's waist, swings her over his shoulder in one fluid motion, and makes a show of marching off to the Bailey.

Axel's hand is on Yuffie's lower back and he can feel her squirming, trying to crane her neck around to see his face. "You better watch your hands, red, or I'll tell Kairi you felt me up," she says warningly.

"Only if you watch your hands, short-stuff," he slaps her wrist genially as she tries to slip something out of his pocket.

Leon watches the exchange in silence, trying his best not to walk up there and murder them both. "Will you two just go do your patrol?" he calls, frustration biting at the edges of his forced calm tone.

Axel waves his free hand and continues to walk. "I already told you we're going. Calm down."

As Axel retreats, Yuffie, still draped over his shoulder, calls down to Leon. "Bye, Squall! See you at dinner!" She punctuates her sentence by blowing him a kiss. Leon can see her hand slipping back into Axel's pocket as they disappear out of sight.

"Idiots," he says, and seriously considers skipping dinner for the sake of his sanity.


End file.
